RE: Off Topic-indulge me please

["Steve Lawson" <steve@steve-lawson.co.uk>]

For the sake of whoever is collecting the statistics , I'm 28, engaged, do
make my living from playing/writing/recording and teaching music (which I
don't see as separate from the creative process, rather a vital part of
it...) I do have some rather wonderful gear (DL4, JamMan, MPX-G2), but 
can't
afford one or two of everything, have a fairly understanding partner who is
also a rather good singer-songwriter, but who does get pissed off with the
hours and hours of answering music related e-mail every day (hey, being the
'gadget guru' for Bassist then Guitarist magazine does tend to generate a
heck of a lot of e-mail, even though the column ended 6 months ago!! :o)

I also feel hugely fortunate to be able to play music 'for myself' but have
enough people respond to it that I can make a living from it. I honestly
have no idea what would happen if I came to the position where  I was asked
to change what I was doing for the sake of making more money. It hasnt'
happened yet, I put together my own label in order to release my CD so that
I had complete control of the whole process from recording to mixing to
packaging, artwork and promotion. I don't actually think there's much of an
ideological split between the pros and not pros on this list, as most of 
the
pros seem to manage to be fairly uncompromised in what they are doing (is
Splattercell a scheming commercial project???? I seriously doubt it!!! :o)
We just happen to be fortunate enough to either make enough money to live,
or be able to live on less money than we might otherwise have got used to 
if
we'd ever had big money jobs!

And I'll add that I've met a fair few people from this list, and they are
all very cool indeed - Had a very enjoyable evening recently with Luca and
Roberto, eating fine food and talking insessently about music and looping
for hours - Luca's poor wife must have been bored out of her mind, but was
incredibly gracious to us... :o)

I'm really looking forward to meeting a load more of you through the 
various
upcoming loop fests, starting on Thursday in Burbank..!!!

BTW, the Manring/Walker/Lawson trio now had a gig in San Jose at the museum
of art , a week on Sunday - e-mail Rick Walker ( GLOBAL@cruzio.com ) for
more info - Rick, along with our Sacremento promotor Daniel Elliott, has
done an unbelieveable job on putting this tour together. The guy has
boundless energy, amazing focus, enthusiasm and creativity, and has given
way above and beyond what any reasonable person could expect. three cheers
for Rick... :o)

cheers

Steve
www.steve-lawson.co.uk